very hard, and I cannot forget that he was chief in silencing Father Sacy."
"A few years ago Father Sacy got Dr. Verity imprisoned for preaching the Word of God. He was two years in a dreadful cell, and his wife and child died while – "
"And pray what does the Word of God say about doing good to those who injure you? Dear Jane, never heed my words. I have a privilege to be ill-natured – the privilege of the losing and the sorrowful."
Thus, in spite of all Jane's efforts, they still found themselves on dangerous or debatable ground. All topics were roads leading thither, and they finally abandoned every kind of tactic and spoke as their hearts prompted them. Then, though some hard things were said, many very kind things were also said, and Matilda rose to go home comforted and helped – for, after all, the tongue is servant to the heart. As she was tying her hat, a maid called Mrs. Swaffham from the room, and Matilda lingered, waiting for her return. She stood with Jane at the window. Their hands were clasped in each other's, but they were silent, and both girls appeared to be looking at the beds full of late flowers – beautiful, pensive flowers, having a positive air of melancholy, as if they felt the sadness of the autumn sunset. But it was not likely that either of them saw the flowers; certainly, Matilda's first words gave no intimation that she did.
"Heigh-ho!" she said, "why should we worry? Everything comes round in time to its proper place, and then it will be, as old Anice expects – the hooks will find the eyes that fit them."
As she spoke, Mrs. Swaffham hastily entered the room, and with her was Lord Cluny Neville. Both girls turned from the window and caught his eyes at the same moment. He was, as Dr. Verity said, a man destined to captivate, not only by his noble bearing and handsome face, but also by such an indescribable charm of manner as opened the door of every heart to him. He carried his morion in his left hand, and in his dress of dark cloth and bright steel looked the very picture of a Puritan paladin. Bowing to both girls, he presented Jane with a letter from her friend Mary Cromwell, and also with a small parcel which contained some beautiful ribbons. The pretty gift made a pleasant introduction to a conversation full of gay inquiries and interesting items of social information. Matilda took little part in it. She watched the young soldier with eyes full of interest, and did not refuse his escort to her carriage; but as she departed, she gave Jane one look which left her with an unhappy question in her heart, not only for that night, but to be recalled long after as premonitory and prophetic.
During the preparations for the evening meal, and while Neville was in his chamber removing his armour and refreshing his clothing, Jane also found time to put on a pretty evening gown. It was of pale brown lutestring, a little lighter and brighter in colour than her own hair, and with its stomacher and collar of white lace it added greatly to the beauty of her appearance. Something had happened to Jane; she was in a delicious anticipation, and she could not keep the handsome stranger out of her consideration. There was a brilliant light in her eyes, and a brilliant colour on her cheeks, and a happy smile on her lovely bow-shaped mouth.
When she heard Neville's steady, swift step coming towards her, she trembled. Why? She did not ask herself, and her soul did not tell her. It indeed warned her, either of joy or of sorrow, for surely its tremor intimated that the newcomer was to be no mere visitor of passage, no neutral guest; that perhaps, indeed, he might have entered her home as a fate, or at least as a messenger of destiny. For who can tell, when a stranger walks into any life, what his message may be? Bringers of great tragedies have crossed thresholds with a smile, and many an unknown enemy has been bidden to the hearth with a welcome.
Jane was in no mood for such reflections. This young soldier, bearing a gift in his hand, had bespoke for himself at his first glance and word the girl's favour. She knew nothing of love, and Dr. Verity's warning had not made her afraid of it. Indeed, there was in her heart a pleasant daring, the touch of unseen danger was exhilarating; she felt that she was on that kind of dangerous ground which calls out all a woman's watchfulness and all her weapons. One of the latter was the possibility of captivating, instead of being captivated. It was a natural instinct, never felt before, but which sprang, full-grown, from Jane's heart as soon as suggested. The desire for conquest! Who has not felt its pushing, irresistible impulse? She accused herself of having given away to Neville's influence without any effort to resist it. That thought in itself arrested her sympathies. Why did she do it? Might she not just as well have brought his right to question? Would she have succumbed so readily to the influence of some beautiful woman? This self-examination made her blush and utter an exclamation of chagrin.
Neville entered gayly in the midst of it. He had removed his steel corselet, and the pliant dark cloth in which he was dressed gave additional grace to his figure and movements. A falling band of Flemish lace was round his throat, and his fine linen showed beneath the loose sleeves of his coat in a band of the same material. His breeches had a bow of ribbon at the knee, and his low shoes of morocco leather a rosette of the same. It was now evident that his hair was very black, and that his eyebrows made dark, bold curves above his sunbrowned cheeks and flashing black eyes – eyes, that in the enthusiasm of feeling or speaking became living furnaces filled with flame. A solar man, sensitive, radiating; one who would move both men and women, whether they would or not.
It was a wonderful evening to both Jane and Mrs. Swaffham. Neville told over again the story of Dunbar, and told it in a picturesque way that would have been impossible to Dr. Verity. Taking whatever he could find that was suitable, he built for them the Lammermuir hills, on which the Scots' army lay; described the swamp at their base; the dark stream – forty feet deep – that ran through it, and the narrow strip by the wild North Sea, where Cromwell's army stood at bay. He made them feel the damp and chill of the gray, desolate place; he made them see the men standing at arms all through the misty night; he made them hear the solemn tones of prayer breaking the silence, and then they understood how the great Cromwell, moving from group to group, saturated and inspired every man with the energy of his own faith and courage. Then he showed them the mighty onslaught, and the ever-conquering General leading it! Through Neville, they heard his voice flinging the battle-cry of the Puritan host in the very teeth of the enemy. They saw him, when the foe fled, leaning upon his bloody sword, pouring out a triumphal Psalm of gratitude so strenuously and so melodiously, that men forgot to pursue, that they might sing. It was a magnificent drama, though there was only one actor to present it.
And when the recital was over and they sat silent, being too much moved to find words for their feeling, he dropped his voice and said, "There is something else. I should like to tell you it, yet I fear that you will not believe me. 'Twas a strange thing, and beyond nature."
"Tell us," said Jane, almost in a whisper. "We should like to hear, should we not, mother?"
Mrs. Swaffham bowed her head, and the young man continued: "It was in the afternoon of the day preceding the battle. The Captain-General had just come back from Dunbar, and his face was full of satisfaction. There was even then on it the light and assurance of victory, and he called the men round him and pointed out the false step the Scots were taking. 'The Lord hath delivered them into our hands!' he said. And as he spoke, the fog was driven before the wind and the rain; and in the midst of it he mounted his horse to ride about the field. And as he stood a moment, looking towards the ships and the sea, this man, this Cromwell, grew, and grew, and grew, until in the sight of all of us, he was a gigantic soldier towering over the army and the plain. I speak the truth. I see yet that prodigious, wraithlike figure, with its solemn face bathed in the storms of battle. And not I alone saw this vision, many others saw it also; and we watched it with awe and amazement, until it blended with the drifting fogs and disappeared."
"Indeed, I doubt it not," said Mrs. Swaffham. "I have seen, I have heard, things in Swaffham that could only be seen and heard by the spiritual senses."
Jane did not speak; she glanced at the young man, wondering at his rapt face, its solemn pallor and mystic exaltation, and feeling his voice vibrate through all her senses, though at the last he had spoken half-audibly, as people do in extremes of life or feeling.
It
